Merriam Webster’s Dictionary: ‘Responsibility - the quality or state of being accountable.’

The word ’responsibility,’ like the word ‘homework,’ does not elicit strong positive responses in most people due to its common and distorted use. ‘Responsibility’ has unfortunately become an unappetizing call to a duty or obligation one must perform whether one wants to or not. It has also become a term used to elicit blame or quilt … not something to get all warm and fuzzy about.

“Johnny, time to come in and do your homework!”“Now, Mary you’re responsible for your little brother. Be sure you take him with you and your friends to the mall.” “I didn’t do it! Billy is responsible!” “Donald Trump is responsible for all my pain and unhappiness!” … and on, and on, and on.

‘Responsibility’ has come to mean anything but accountability. Just say the word and do nothing; that’s enough. Whenever a celebrity or politician stands before the lights and cameras and declares, “I take full responsibility for my actions!” rest assured the problem will end there and nothing will be done to correct it. When Attorney General, Janet Reno declared, “I take full responsibility,” after the tragedy in Waco, Texas that saw 80 people killed by federal agents on April 19, 1993, nothing was ever done to address what happened. No steps were ever put into place to prevent it from happening again. Responsibility stopped with a simple declaration.

However, ‘responsibility,’ in its true meaning, is a powerful response to a call for action. We hear the call - we respond, we take responsibility. ‘Respond’ is what an adult does when the needs and opportunities of life calls one to action. In responding we consciously initiate growth and change.

‘Taking responsibility’ is the first condition necessary for any healing to occur. Yes, it’s true you can cure a health issue without taking responsibility, but you’ll never heal the issue until you do. Without healing the issue will, and must, surface again in a similar form or another. ‘Responsibility’ means ‘respond’; take action; address what needs to be addressed; initiate the change.’ It’s a powerfully magical force that opens one to unlimited opportunities for unparalleled healing and growth.

Whatever we have shoved in our unconscious, good or bad, in this lifetime or in others, will in time surface and become conscious to us. All health issues, life issues, emotional issues, etc. have their source in the unconscious. But these issues do not become conscious without warning. When they start to surface they begin as ‘whispers,’ and when not responded to by taking responsibility will, in time, become ‘shouts.’ Respond to the whispers from your unconscious and you will no longer have to contend with the shouts. Cancer, for example, is a pretty loud shout.

The purpose of our life is to learn how to enjoy, and how to consciously create that life. The goal of everyone’s life is to become more of his/her Truer Self; anything other than that is, in my opinion, a distraction. ‘Responsibility’ is a gift we possess that, when used, can allow us to become more of who we are and to grow to spontaneously live our life’s purpose

Our Relationship to Responsibility: The Three Levels

There are essentially three levels of clients a therapist will face in the willingness, or lack thereof, to taking responsibility for the healing process:

(1) The Get-by’s: No matter what healer this client goes to, or what healing procedure he/she chooses, this client will not take the responsibility required for healing to happen. The ‘Get-by’s’ are life’s victims, or so they erroneously believe, and it’s up to others to take responsibility for them … after all, they are the ones who are suffering don’t you see. To them, healing is about getting attention. This group does not, except for some exceptions, want the pain and suffering in their lives. This is true. However, what they want more then healing the pain and suffering is the attention that the pain and suffering provides them; the attention they so desperately seek. For them, attention equates to love.

“Oh, no I can’t! I can’t! I’m suffering! “I’m too much in pain! I need you to do it!” their soulful reply.

Their life is a ‘get by’ one day at a time affair. Theirs is a life with no future; only the sad existence of simply getting by. As a healer there is not much you can do for them. If you were to make their lives more comfortable it would not fit in with their template of pain and suffering as the means to gain attention, and therefore love. They’ll eventually sabotage the effort. The ‘Get-byes’ are the smallest of the three groups; but the clear majority the country’s wealth, and the healers focus and energy, is on them. They are the attention getters.

(2)The Move On’s: This client will take some degree of responsibility. They will, for the most part, cooperate with their therapist’s suggestions and treatment options. They’ll take the pills, attend the sessions, undergo the operation, and do all that is required to ‘move on’ with their lives. But don’t dare ask them to go to their dark and hidden places where the true healing is required. That’s a line they will not cross. To the ‘Move-On’s,’ healing is fixing the problem only. To them, pain and suffering is a temporary setback. “Fix the problem so I can ‘move on’ with my life.” Sure, they can cure the cancer, or whatever problem they’re experiencing, but this problem is only an out-picturing of an inner unconscious template needing attention. Unless healed, it will emerge again; in the same or a completely different form … in this lifetime or another. These dark and hidden places hold a very deep level of pain that must, for healing to happen, be felt completely. And although the ‘Move On’s’ can feel deep and frequent emotions, they will not allow themselves to experience the deeper of these emotions to the full extent required for releasing them. What emotions they feel are safe emotions for them. It’s one thing to be emotional; it’s another to plunge into the emotion to discover and retrieve the power hidden in the depth. The pain, the rage, the dread, etc. will never be released until the power they hold is brought back and made a part of you. This is the good news. What the ‘Move On’s’ do not let in is that as they invade their own emotional privacy they become free of the pain, the hurt, the rage they’ve stored so deeply. There is tremendous power in the hidden emotions. Power that can be used to create magnificent futures of healing, magic, and dreams manifested. This power can be used to catapult one into the heights of unimagined freedom. The ‘Move-On’s’ are the largest of the three groups.

(3)The Move Beyond’s: This group will take responsibility. Their choice is no longer to get by or move on. They’re here to move beyond. They’re not here to patch up or repair their current vehicle; they’re here to discover a whole new mode of transportation. Unlike the ‘Move On’s’ they’ll invade their hidden and forbidden dark places and discover the incredible power lost there, and they’ll bring it back to integrate it within themselves; and they will succeed for the whole universe is there to help. However, it is important to note that the ‘Move Beyond’s’ will put up the most fight and offer the most resistance during this process. After all, they are going into the unknown of themselves and are willing to risk all in doing so. They will be the most frightened; but again, they will succeed. It’s ironic that the attention so desperately sought by the ‘Get-By’s,’ and the safety so rigidly needed by the ‘Move On’s,’ are available to this group in unlimited supply. Fear is the limiter of the first two groups; responsibility is the liberator of the third. All are loved, supported, and helped; but it is only the third group that chooses to take the responsibility to be willing and to be allowing in the receiving of it. They are moving beyond their old templates and current set and discovering the incredible majesty of their future. And what a magical and marvelous journey it will be. Because our world is in the midst of monumental change, this group is the fastest growing group. The times require it. The ‘Move Beyond’s’ will require a different type of healer to help them on their journey; for not all healers can help them. The healer must be a ‘Move Beyond’ as well.

Ending the Cycle of Cause and Effect

To awaken the magic of responsibility, and in so doing reclaim the authorship of your reality, the following steps can be incredibly powerful.

Cause and effect is not how things or events become reality. Resonance is how everything comes into existence. Whenever we get caught in the cycle of cause and effect we are, in fact, in resonance with it. It feels like we’re out of control because we’ve given our control over to it. Example: A careless driver hits your car. Your natural reaction is to blame the driver and the event for your discomfort. It’s true, the driver hit your car and initiated the negative event, and it’s ok to get angry at him and upset over what happened; to do otherwise would put yourself in denial. The real source of the discomfort is not in the driver or the accident, they are just the ‘button-pushers,’ the real source of the upheaval is in you. Get angry, be upset - but step back when you are in a place to do so and check in with yourself. You’ll find, if you are willing to exercise responsibility, a tremendous opportunity for deep healing here. A ‘shout’ from your unconscious is needing your attention. It took the shakeup of the accident to bring it to you. Step back from what you think is the cause (the accident) and address what needs to be addressed; the issue within. Listen and attend to the ‘shout’: your anger, fear, pain, etc. It’s from a place very deep within; not from the accident. Your outer illusion always reflects your inner reality. Don’t be in resonance with the false story; instead, be in resonance with the inner issue needing healing and choose to lift it elegantly.

(2) At a time and place that’s conducive for your inner work, check in with yourself. Don’t wait too long, however, as the issue up to be healed can recede back into the unconscious. Ask that what needs to be addressed come to the surface, now. Be quiet. Be still. Close your eyes. Allow yourself to feel the emotions that will, if you’re not pushing them back down, surface. Deeply feel the rage, or the hurt, or the fear, or any of the emotion(s) that surface. Own those emotions by feeling them. Don’t give them over to blame, self-pity, or martyr. The more honestly you feel these emotions the more liberating you’ll feel.

(3) Release these emotions by forgiving yourself and choosing to let them go. Give your Higher Self the negative emotions so that he/she can transform the negative resonance into a positive resonance of power. Your Higher Self will return the resonance to you at some point transformed and healed.

(4) Now, engage your reality differently. Be willing to be changed, but more importantly, allow yourself to be changed. Make a choice to challenge the old story and be willing to be new. Start exercising you power of choice. Be different. Act different. Challenge the stories you tell yourself that you’re not the author of all you experience.

Do these steps each time to separate yourself from the false story and the potential cycle of cause and effect. In time you will, more and more, be in resonance with the future you … the Truer You. More and more your life will have a synchronous fluidity, and the old ways your unconscious gets your attention will be less needed. This is what living the wholeness of life really means.

Over ninety years ago, quantum physicists discovered experimentally that all matter is, in fact, not matter at all … it’s a wave. And, they discovered that when attention is given, a wave collapses into particle, thus creating form … matter. When the ancients described all reality as an illusion, they were, in fact, stating a truth that modern scientists proved thousands of years later. The ‘single slot’ and ‘double slot’ experiments were two notable examples of those quantum discoveries. In the ‘single slot’ experiment, researchers made a box and placed a tiny hole in one side, and a tiny hole in the opposite side. Inside the box, they lined the walls with a photo-like filament that could record trackings, or “footprints,” when anything interacted with it. They then shot a particle of light (a photon) into one of the holes. What emerged through the hole on the opposite side was a particle of light. However, what amazed the researchers, was when they opened the box they found trackings (footprints) along the filament lined walls of the box that indicated the movement of a wave. In other words, the particle, once in the box, and out of the attention of the observer, reverted to its natural state … a wave. It collapsed into a particle when attention was given as it emerged from the hole on the opposite side of the box. In the ‘double slot’ experiment, researchers made a box with two tiny holes in one side, and a single tiny hole in the opposite. When the photon was shot into the single hole, it emerged as two particles, one from each of the holes on the opposite side. What makes this so remarkable is the fact that you cannot divide a single particle into two particles. Where did the second particle come from? The scientists concluded that it resulted from the attention, and intention, given by the observer … the scientists themselves. In other words, the wave responded by collapsing into two particles due to not only the attention given by observer, but also the observers intention. What can we conclude from this?All reality is a wave (illusion) made real (form) based on the attention, and intention, given it. Everything in our experience (reality) is, in truth, a wave … it becomes real to us, physical (particle), when we give it attention. What we experience is also a product of our intention. What we intend something to be, whether we are conscious of it or not, will determine what we give attention to. And, as a result, what we experience. Let’s put it this way. You are sitting in a room. Everything outside this room, everything outside your experience is, in fact, a wave … it’s not form, it’s a wave. Only when you give attention does the wave become real to you because you collapsed the wave into particle. When you sleep at night, everything, including you, is in its natural state … a wave. You are not conscious. You are unconscious. You are not giving attention to anything; therefore, everything is a wave. Your dreams are not form. They are information emerging from your unconscious, filtered through the patterns of your subconscious, to create the stories you experience while sleeping. When you awake, the wave becomes a form (reality) because you now give it attention. “But wait,” you say. “My husband reading next to me is still in three-dimensional form even though I’m asleep, isn’t he?” That’s true … for him … because he is awake and giving attention to himself, and the room, and whatever else he’s giving attention to. But to you, he’s no longer form. He’s more real ... he’s non-dimensional wave. You’re asleep. You are not giving him attention. You are not collapsing the wave into particle. Wave is real. Particle, our perceived reality, is illusion. Again, as the ancients once taught, our reality is an illusion … a real illusion that we make real so we can interact with it. Our reality is really a ‘make believe’ story. We make it (collapse the wave) and believe it to be true. We give our reality attention and meaning: Everything in our reality … no exceptions. This is how we, as a consciousness in three-dimensional form, exist in a three-dimensional illusion. To make reality real for us we need materials from which to craft that reality. These materials consist of our beliefs, attitudes, thoughts, feelings, choices, and decisions. All reality for us is glued together by these components. Change your reality, change these components. Your reality is really a story, a play, you convince yourself is real. The story (the play) is not real, but you believe it is. Make believe. Nothing in your reality … nothing … is what you think it is. You give it belief in accordance to what you give attention to, and the intention and meaning you give it. If your play is that of victimhood, the reality you experience is that of victim. You are not, in truth, a victim, but your attention on victim, and the intention behind it, and the meaning it holds for you, make it so. Change the story and you change your reality. But to do this you must change the attention you give to it, the intention behind it, as well as the meaning is holds for you. You must also change the beliefs, attitudes, thoughts, feelings, choices, and decisions you are still holding onto around the victim story. When a client comes to a therapist’s office, it is important for the therapist to know that whatever the client is saying is just a story the client is making real for him/her self … nothing more. Challenge the story. It’s not what’s real. Its make-believe … real make-believe, that’s true … but make-believe, nevertheless. If the therapist buys into the story, he/she is doing nothing but enabling the problem … buying into the illusion. The problem is the ‘why’ of the story, not the story itself. Change the story by addressing the ‘why’ of it. Change the ‘why’ of the story and you can rewrite it. Shakespeare’s Hamlet is a story. It’s not real. If you are living the Hamlet story, attend to the Hamlet within you. It’s from that inner place within you that you determine what to give attention, intention, and meaning to. Once attended, and healed by addressing the ‘why’ of it, you can write another story for yourself. Maybe this time, a love story, or a story of enchanting adventure … or both. The reality you experience will always be a story written by what you give attention to, the intention behind it, and the meaning you give it. You are making it, and you’re believing it true - make believe. But, know this, you are destined live a story that will, over time, reflect more and more the real of yourself … the very essence of the magnificence of the Truer You … that wave resonance, you truly are. But first you must be conscious of the current story(s) you’re convincing yourself is real. You must own that story(s) by attending to the ‘why’ of it. You must choose to let the old story go, and exercise the courage to do so. You must forgive yourself for having held onto it. And, you must act to engage a different outcome, one more reflective of what you discover of what’s truer in yourself. This, my friends, is what life is about … becoming more of who you truly are with elegance and grace, with fun, and filled with abundance. All are destined for this … later, if not sooner. Living a life of freedom. Living who you truly are. Living and expanding always into more. As always, it’s your call. So, what’s your story?

One evening, a man standing beneath a street lamp was busily engaged in searching for something he’d lost. A stranger walk by, noticed the man, and asked,

“Sir, did you lose something?”

The man replied, “Why, yes, I lost my car keys”.

The kind stranger immediately offered to help him find the lost keys.

After some time searching, with no results, the stranger, frustrated but wanting to be helpful, asked,

“Sir, are you sure you lost the keys here?”

“Oh, no!” said the man. “I lost them over there by the wall. In the shadows.”

“Why are we looking, here?” exclaimed the stunned stranger.

“Because there’s more light.” replied the man.

Like the story of the lost keys, one will never find true healing until one knows where to look. We can cure the problem, that is true. But curing does not necessarily equal healing. The terms “curing” and “healing” are often misunderstood. To many, they are used interchangeably to refer to the same thing. Although both have as their objective the putting an end to a problem; physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual, what it means to cure a problem is vastly different from what it means to heal it. While curing is correctly thought of as ending a problem, healing goes further by not only ending the problem, but addressing the foundation of the problem at its root cause(s) thus ending the very need for the problem in the first place. The differences are in space and time. Curing is temporary; healing permanent. Although curing always occurs instantaneously, it unfolds in our lives over time. Healing, too, occurs instantaneously, but it transcends time and space to alter time and space. Curing fixes us, healing changes us. For example, if I have a problem with mosquitoes, I can spray the pond killing the mosquito larvae. This will fix (cure) the problem … temporarily. However, the pond is still there. The mosquitoes will lay eggs again. The problem will return. But if I drain the pond (heal it), thus addressing the root cause, I will permanently change the problem. No more mosquitoes. Healing practitioners may claim they heal, but most don’t. That does not take away the importance of their work. But healing is not what they do. They can correct the problem. They can even end the problem. But, the pond is still there. Healing is not accomplished. Let me use an illustration. At the bottom of a pond, a frog burps. A bubble is formed. As it rises to the surface it grows bigger and bigger. In time we see the bubble at the surface of the pond. The bubble did not originate at the surface. It did not even originate when the first bubble formed. It originated as a distress in the frog lying deep beneath the sand. Addressing the bubble anywhere other than within the frog is valuable, but it’s not healing. Let’s use an example: A patient has a defective heart value. The doctor surgically replaces the malfunctioning valve and the patient now lives an active and normal life. The doctor did not heal the patient, he cured him.This in no way diminishes the value of what the doctor did. On the contrary,addressing the heart condition … ‘the bubble’ … when we catch it … ‘at the surface of the pond’ … is of the utmost importance. But, it is not healing. Remember, the bubble originated within the frog. We experience the bubble only when it surfaces in the same way we experience the heart condition when we have the symptoms, or it is detected in some other way. Unless dealt with at its source, the bubble will emerge again in a similar form, or perhaps in a different form. But It willsurface again. It is not healed! And because it’s not healed it will continue to emerge in some form until it has. The problem will always demand our attention. The bubble always comes to the surface, never the other way around. The problem is not the bubble, the problem is the frog’s distress. Where to look? All illness (physical, mental, emotional, spiritual) originates within the Unconscious. We, in time, experience it consciously after it is processed through our Subconscious filters. The malfunctioning heart valve may have resulted due to any number of factors from poor diet, stress, genetic or environmental influence, etc. but its true origins lie within the Unconscious. The factors leading to the faulty valve are the emerging bubbles as they rise to the surface. We see the bubble at the surface, but we do not observe the bubbles surfacing from the frog. Everything is the Unconscious. All our realty is that part of the Unconscious we make real for ourselves consciously. It is an out-picturing of our inner, hidden world. We have measuring devices we use to do this; our five senses, our beliefs and attitudes, thoughts and feelings, choices and decisions, our temporal lobes, subconscious projections, etc. Think of our reality is a movie projected on a screen. It is not real. It is, in truth, only an illusion we make real, believe is real, apply our ‘suspension of disbelief’ to. The movie is on the film we wrote, produced and placed within the projector. Change the movie, change the film … change what we observe and experience. Trying to change it on the screen is pointless. The images on the screen are not real, the story on the film we created is, however, real for us. It is real because we believe it is. How do we heal, then? Do we go into the Unconscious somehow to discover what is there? You could, but you wouldn’t remember what you discovered … you’re unconscious! There are, however, two ways to know what the Unconscious is telling you, what it is trying to get your attention to address:

(1) We could wait … knowing that whatever is within our Unconscious, will, in time, become conscious. We will experience what lies within our Unconscious when, in time, it expresses itself in our reality … when the bubble reaches the surface. This method, though everyone does it, is not recommendedor(2) We can listen to its whispers. We can listen to how the Unconscious speaks to us in our reality. We can listen for the emerging bubbles. We can learn to understand its language, and we can choose to act upon it.

The language of the Unconscious is not linear language. It does not speak to us in English, French, Latin, or Urdu. It speaks in the non-linear language of myth, metaphor, archetype, and symbol. When we can step back and look to our reality as a myth, a metaphor, a reflection of an archetype, a symbol, we can gain a greater sense of what its telling us. When we step back from the movie and accept that we are its author, we then have the power to be conscious of it, and, if we choose, change it. In linear language, ‘heart’ is a specific organ of the body. In the language of the Unconscious it may involve any issue concerning love … be it issues with self-love, love’s loss (love’s pain), love’s absence, love’s humiliation, love’s betrayal, etc., etc. When made conscious in our reality, issues of the heart can manifest at the surface of the pond as physical conditions, or relationship problems, or any other areas of our life we would relate to the heart. Address the Unconscious issue and there is no need for its physical manifestation. The bubble would not surface if the distress of the frog is attended to. The Unconscious must be attended to consciously. In linear language, ‘blood’ means “the fluid that circulates in the heart, arteries, capillaries, and veins that carry nourishment and oxygen to, and brings away waste from, all parts of the body” (Merriam Webster Dictionary). High blood pressure, leukemia, or any health issues involving blood, is our Unconscious speaking of deeper issues needing attending to. Perhaps around family, community, the nurturing of loved ones (or lack thereof), our personal sense of connection, et al. ‘Blood’ is a metaphor for the more real issue(s) in the Unconscious. Remember … whatever is in the Unconscious will, in time, become conscious. Whatever gas is within the frog must emerge and grow until it emerges full blown at the pond’s surface. It is important to also be aware that we are not being attacked, here. We are not being punished. The Unconscious is trying to get our attention, that is all. It is trying to help us. It is trying to tell us to address a hidden problem that stands between us and living a life of health, happiness and freedom. Although this may seem a shocker, everything in our reality is there to help us become more of who we really are. Nothing in our reality is there to harm us unless we create, or allow it so. We may not have created the malfunctioning heart valve, the cancer, the heart attack, etc., but we allowed it by not listening to the whispers before they became shouts. When we pay attention to our Unconscious whispers, when we learn to listen and observe our realty with sharpened and honed measuring devices, we can transcend anything. We can turn a tragedy into a love story; a melodrama into a comedy. We can just re-write the story in the projector. Like the lost car keys, true healing, as well as discovering the more real of you, requires that you look in the darkest shadows of yourself. Healing awaits you, there. Treasures beyond what you can imagine await you, there.